


A Good Match

by perniciousLizard



Series: Fired Up and Bone Weary [6]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: M/M, Original Character(s), Post-Pacifist Route
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-02-28
Packaged: 2018-05-23 19:01:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6126904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perniciousLizard/pseuds/perniciousLizard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grillby is invited to a family wedding and Sans is invited along with him.  Not everyone is overjoyed at Grillby’s choice in partners.  But, hey, at least there’s an open bar.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Good Match

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the people on tumblr (alphasterpentis and sweetlysour94 sent very nice messages) who encouraged me to write this fic despite my nervousness about all the OCs in it!

Sans leaned back on the couch, until he was watching Grillby upside down in the kitchen.  Grillby was on the phone with another fire monster. Probably a relative.  Grillby wasn’t talking much, but his speech patterns were faster than normal, and Sans could only pick out bits and pieces.  

“…………doing well………news………brother isn’t……”  

Did Grillby have a brother?  He knew there was a mom and a niece.  He’d met the niece, years ago, Underground.  Oh, right.  A niece usually meant there’d be a sibling.  

“…i am very busy, so…”  

Sounded like someone was getting turned down.  Sans sat back up before all the ketchup ran into his skull and came out his nose hole.  

The monster on the other end of the line did most of the talking for a while and Sans wasn’t left with much to eavesdrop on.  He started to zone out, and then he heard Grillby say “Sans” a couple times.  

“talkin about me, grillbz?” Sans asked, winking.  "only good things, i hope.“  

Grillby shooed him and pointed at his phone.  He said very little else until he finished with a polite "goodbye” and hung up.  

“that your niece or something?”

“…my mother,” he said.  

“checkin up on you?”

He nodded and put his phone back into his pocket.  "…apparently a cousin is getting married, and I am invited."  

"you going?  gotta be the hottest event of the season.”  

“I doubt it.  I have too much to do.”

“you can’t close the bar for day?”  Maybe Grillby just didn’t want to see his family, or that part of his family.  Sans had no real clue how he felt about them.  He voluntarily lived pretty far from where most of the fire monsters had settled down.

“If I had to.”  He opened up the fridge and started pulling out ingredients.  "You were also invited.“

"not sure they’d warm up to me if i just showed up, ate their food, and drank their booze without you there.”

“Do you want to meet my family?”  Grillby didn’t sound like he cared, particularly.  

It struck Sans as kind of strange.  Grillby was just such a warm person, who would listen to complete strangers pour out their worst problems and sympathize.  He seemed like he should be a family man; someone who took more than the occasional trip out to visit his mom.  

Grillby just had the bar, and the people in it.  It wasn’t _nothing,_ sure, but it was weird.  Maybe Sans was looking at it from a biased perspective.  He couldn’t imagine having a brother and not at least talking with him regularly.  

“some reason why i wouldn’t?  wait.  i wouldn’t have to wear a suit, right?”

Grillby tipped his head down and smiled.  "…i would like to see that, but, no."  He started peeling potatoes, with such flawless ease he didn’t even seem to be paying attention to what he was doing.  "My family is…” he trailed off, searching for the right word. “…tiring.”  

“look, grillby, it’s up to you.  i’ll be your date, if i don’t have something else already planned.”  

“Weddings are usually two days,” he explained.  "There is a party, and then the next day, we have the ceremony."  He sighed.  "It _has_ been a while since I’ve seen everyone.”  

–-

“There are going to be things you shouldn’t eat,” Grillby said.  He looked himself over in their hotel mirror.  He had his tuxedo cleaned, just for this, and it looked crisp and new.  

“i’m guessing if it’s on fire, don’t stick it in my mouth,” Sans said.  

“…yes.”

“you remember how last week i fell asleep at your place and you just tossed a blanket over me and didn’t wake me up?  when i did wake up i was really out of it and i thought i’d fallen asleep on the couch at home.  i went to the kitchen and grabbed a carton out of the fridge.  it’s just like the one paps keeps milk in." 

"…no, you _didn’t_."

"yeah, so for a sec i just thought it’d gone bad, like, _real bad_.  but i’m still standing.  so long as it isn’t on fire or, i dunno, acid, it isn’t going to hurt me to eat it, grillbz.”  

Grillby nodded.  "One more thing.  There will be a very tall blue fire monster.  He is my uncle.  Avoid him."

"why?  no sense of humor?”

“…he would actually probably like you, but…he has never had much self control.”  

“oh. this is going to be a _blast_ , isn’t it?”  Sans chuckled.  

Grillby stopped fussing with his clothes.  "… _one more_ one more thing," he said.  "My mother is not going to like you. Don’t waste energy trying to fix that.”

“i do like not wasting my energy,” Sans said.  "what’s not to like about me?"

"Nothing.  She asked me about you, and then disliked what I said.”  Grillby shrugged.  

This sounded like it was going to be tons of fun.  Sans felt _great_ about helping convince Grillby to visit his family.  "ok."

–

Grillby’s mom was about six feet tall, bright orange, and she wore a hat like a black and white movie starlet and an evening gown that almost touched the floor.  Sans strained his back trying to look over someone so much taller than him.

"hey, i remember you,” he said, grasping her hand and shaking it.  It was hot to the touch, but not enough to hurt him.  "you used to stop by all the time and get ‘dogs."  She hadn’t been in full evening dress, back then, but he remembered a lot of different hats.

"……," she said.  

"No,” Grillby answered.  Sans wished he would say a few more words to at least give him a little context.  Like, “no, he doesn’t have a stand anymore,” or “no, you can’t set my friend on fire and go raid the open bar.”  Just, a little something to lend a guy a hand.

“......, Sans,” she said.  

“uh.  searily, right?”  Maybe that wouldn’t be a rude subject change out of nowhere.

“Yes,” she said.  "Sans, ……………………“  

"I need to greet the couple,” Grillby said.  

“yeah, hey, i want to meet those kids.”  

Once they were out of earshot of Grillby’s mother, Sans said, “i had no idea she was your mom.  i always liked her.”  She left a tip when he had hot sauce as a condiment option – no one else left tips.  She was a class act.

“…you don’t have to, on my account.”  

“nothin' to do with it.”

“…were you having trouble?”

“i’m getting the hang of it.”  He shrugged.  "i’ll get it before i get hanged for it, probably.  she sounds just like you, just she doesn’t slow down for lazy monsters like me."  

Grillby nodded.  

Sans was having trouble reading Grillby’s mood.  He was keeping his fire pretty carefully in line.  If Sans had to guess an emotion, he’d go for "annoyed,” but at what?  His family?  Sans?  Not that Sans could blame him for that one.  

The were heading towards the best dressed pair of fire monsters in the crowd.  They looked like a couple of good kids, and they confirmed it when he said “it’s a beautiful wedding.  even the cake’s in tiers” and they laughed.  

“i can tell the two of you make a good match.”  

Grillby groaned at that one, but his mood seemed to improve.  

“i want to hear about the proposal.  i bet it was _engaging_.”

Eventually, Grillby took Sans to a table where he could sit down.  There was food you had to get up and get yourself, some of it probably even edible, and an open bar calling out to him.  He was sure he would answer the call in due time.

Grillby seemed to trust him enough now not to walk directly into the guy that was made entirely of lava or to drink the kerosene, so Sans was left alone for a while to take in the crowd and get his skull together.  

A toddler was running around the table next to the one Sans was at, their fire dad sitting at his seat looking like he’d be all right if the world stopped rotating if that meant he could get a break.  

The kid ran up to their dad and tugged at his pant leg until the guy opened up a container of snacks and handed it over.  The kid immediately picked up some kind of square shaped snack and set it on fire.  They burst into tears that looked like lava streaming down their face.  

The man picked up the child and looked at Sans, apologetic.  "They’re over-excited," he said.  

"i know what it’s like.  my brother used to get worked up when he burned his pasta.”  Sure, Papyrus had been an adult at the time, but Sans understood.  

Sans eventually felt energetic enough to go over to the food tables.  The caterer was another fire monster and Sans wondered if she and Grillby had ever run in the same circles.  He also found enough energy to make it to the open bar.  Most of the monsters stayed around only as long as it took to get their drinks, but a small star-shaped monster was hovering there.  

“hey, you’re heats, right?” Sans asked.  

“YOU REMEMBERED MY NAME?” Heats asked, shocked.  

“yeah, sure, buddy.  who’re you with?”  He didn’t look much like anyone in Grillby’s family and he was about a foot shorter than anyone in the other family.  

“I’M SOMEONE’S DATE!”

“oh. me too.  don’t be too shocked, but i’m not related to anyone here.”

“REALLY?”

Sans leaned back against the bar.  "nah.  who’s your date?  maybe i know 'em.“  

"I HAVE NO IDEA!  IT WAS A BLIND DATE, BUT I CAN’T EVEN FIND THE PERSON WHO SET IT UP!  I CAN’T BELIEVE THEY FORGOT ME!”

“that’s pretty rude.  like, a major social _misfire_.”

Heats Flamesman was too depressed to laugh, or he missed the joke.  Sans got his drink and went back to his table.  Grillby was sitting at the table, looking in a better mood than Sans had seen him in since they got to the party.  

“if i’d known you were going to be back here, i would’ve grabbed you a drink.  oh well.”  He sat down.  He wasn’t walking all the way across the room again.  

“…I’ve had a few already.”  

“so that’s why you’ve _brightened up_ so much.”  

He let Grillby take a couple hors d'oeuvres off his plate.  

At the table next door, the fire dad pulled a striped shirt out of an enormous duffle bag.  "Now, you’re going to keep this on like a big kid, right?"

"Right!!” the kid said.  Their dad put the shirt on them, and the collar immediately started to burn at the edges.  It probably wasn’t the first big kid shirt of the day.  

“were you like that, grillbz?” Sans asked.  He was picturing the little kid with Grillby glasses, but the image wouldn’t work in his head.  His imagination put miniature Grillby in his full bartending uniform.  

“…I don’t remember being that age.”  He shrugged.  "Probably, though."

Sans wished Grillby’s mom liked him, so she’d send him baby pictures.  

"hey, kiddo,” Sans said, figuring the dad wouldn’t mind if someone distracted his flaming ball of joy and energy for a couple minutes.  "it’s a shame you didn’t get that snack before.  want a chip?"

The kid’s dad was fine with someone else giving them attention, for a minute.  He kept an eye on them as they toddled over for the chip Sans held out.  

Sans gestured and the chip disappeared.  "hey.  where’d it go?”

The kid looked briefly distressed.  

“wait a sec, here.  how’d you get it already?”  He leaned down and pulled the chip out of the front pocket of their shirt.  "huh."

They stared at it, amazed, and then snatched it out of Sans’ fingers. They looked at their dad.  "Magic?”  

“He had it hidden up his sleeve, actually,” the dad said.  "Or something."  

"Wow!” Even more amazing than magic!  "Do it again!"  They shoved the chip into their mouth, so Sans had to re-demonstrate the trick with a cocktail weenie.  

After the kid got tired of eating Sans’ food and went over to their dad, Sans turned back around in his chair and saw Grillby watching him, amused.  

"if you want something to eat, all i’ve got left to pull out of your pocket is this chicken leg.”  

“I’m fine.”  

“normally you pull it out the kid’s ear, but i’ve counted three ears at this whole party, combined.”  All on the same monster.

Grillby eventually got up to go judge the quality of the catering.  Sans looked around the crowd.  He wasn’t the only non-fire monster there, but his lack of skin let him hang out closer to the center of things than they could.  

Grillby’s mom met Grillby at the catering table, and they spoke for a few minutes. Sans watched from the table, sipping his drink.  He saw Grillby’s good mood poof away, like smoke, after just a few words from her.  

It was a strange thing.  There were fire monsters everywhere, and some of them were mad or worked up about something.  Sans had passed by a pair of women having a playful fight about a television show and even just messing around the one woman had gotten a foot taller and a lot hotter.  

Grillby didn’t react like that.  He looked pretty much the same, but by the time his mother walked away, he was angrier than Sans had ever seen him.  He showed it more in the way he was leaning away from his mother, and in the way he held his arms.  

Sans started to get up, but Grillby disappeared into the crowd and Sans couldn’t see himself actually tracking him down.  He should probably give it a shot.  He kept working on his drink, mulling over his options.  

Searily sat down in the chair opposite him.  

“hey,” Sans said.  "some party, huh.“

"Yes,” she said.  

“shame grillbz’s having such a bad time.”  He was trying to keep the judgment out of his tone, but he was starting to get a little po’d about whatever was going on here.  

“Yes,” she agreed.  "Tell me, Sans……………spend your time?"

"how do i spend my time?  i dunno.  i get a lot of naps in, do some babysitting.”  It was none of her business, but that clarified what she didn’t like about him.  He had been wondering if she’d always pictured her son with some enormous handsome lava monster and here he was just being a skeleton and ruining her dreams.  

“And how does………spend his time?”  

“grillby?  running a restaurant is a lot of work, and he does it mostly by himself.  you should visit if you need me to tell you that.”  

“I don’t.  I know……………works………”  

Sans rubbed his skull.  "fire that one at me again.“  

"I know my son works hard,” she said, with a little more care.  She seemed to want him to get that.  

“what i’m getting here is that you don’t have a real problem with me.  i mean, i cook a mean 'dog, and i have a great sense of humor, what’s not to like.  but you can’t wrap your wick around why he’d bring me along as a date.”  

She nodded.  "When he was younger, he would talk about……restaurant…….also………"  She glanced off into the crowd and sighed.  She trailed a finger on the tabletop, leaving a black swirling design wherever she touched.  "…hoped to find someone who would run it with him, who…the same……"

"grillby did?” He laughed.  "kids are great, but they’re kind of dumb, aren’t they?  nice to know he was, anyway, like everyone else."

She leaned in, annoyed.  The air around them got a little warmer.  "……………………………"  

"god.  i’m imagining grillby trying to run his place and having to listen to what someone else says about it.” Sans laughed, once. “grillby’s a pal, so i wouldn’t run the divorce betting pool, but i might slide some gold under the table when no one was looking.  grillby puts up with my brother making menu suggestions, but i’m trying to imagine how it would go if he thought he had to actually listen." 

He shrugged and leaned back in his chair.  "look, that place is his baby.  he’s always overworked because he doesn’t want to hire on more people, and he’d get to boss _them_ around.”  Sans appreciated that about Grillby, that he was always going to do what he was going to do.  He figured everyone else was like him, so if you told Grillby your problems he wouldn’t unload advice on you.  He’d just listen.  

“maybe he could _strike sparks_ with someone who owns their own place and they could talk shop, but they’d have time to go out every six years.”  He spotted Grillby talking with someone on the other side of the room.  "maybe i’m not the ideal _match_ , but at least we get out sometimes."  

She was also looking at her son.  She seemed somewhat subdued.  "…Sans, tell me.  When you were a child, what did you want?"

He wasn’t entirely sure what to make of the question.  "i didn’t really have anyone i pictured myself with, if that’s what you’re asking.”  He looked at her, and winked.  "no celebrities or anything.  it was a different kind of star i was after." 

She seemed to consider this.  After a minute, she said something he didn’t quite catch and got up and left the table.  

Grillby came back almost as soon as she was out of sight.  "…you look overheated.  Do you want to step outside for a minute?"

It was pretty stuffy with all the fire monsters, but it only actually bothered Sans when it got hot enough he thought he might get scorched.  "sure.”  Sounded like Grillby was the one who needed fresh air.  

Grillby was still angrier than Sans had ever seen him.  He didn’t say a single word until they were outside.  The air out there felt almost shockingly cold.

There were no immediately available chairs, so they sat down on some steps out of the way.  

"i think your mom and i see eye to eye now.  as much as we can, since neither of us have 'em.”  

Grillby shook his head.  "It doesn’t matter."

"well. sure.  except you wouldn’t be fired up like this if it didn’t.”

"She brought me a date, knowing I invited you.”  

Sans stared at him.  "…i hope you mean the food kind of date."

Grillby didn’t say a word.  

"welp.” That was kind of funny, actually.  He wondered how she’d justified that, in her head.  She had to know Grillby well enough to get that he wouldn’t go along with the set up, even if the monster she found was the Mettaton of fire monsters.  So the reason would be…to make her feelings clear?  To make a point?  To get Grillby angry at her instead of just ignoring her?  "oh, man.  was it the guy by the bar?"

"I have no idea who it was.”  

“that poor guy.  about my height, kind of looks like a star?  said whoever set him up hadn’t introduced him to his date yet.”  

“Oh. I know who you mean.”  Grillby frowned and said, quieter, to himself, “What was his name?  Fireman?  Heater?  Never mind.”  With only the slightest visible difference, Grillby started to calm down.  

“you’re kind of cool, grillbz,” Sans said, laughing a little.  Poor Heats, though.  

Grillby shook his head.

“i’m not saying it was a smart move, but i think i get where she’s coming from,” Sans said.  "like you and bro have a weird thing going on, because of me."  

"Papyrus thinks I should go out with you, but I don’t think he likes me.  But we’re friends,” Grillby said, slowly.  "He insisted.  It’s actually the opposite problem, with my mother."

“family just gets overprotective.”

Grillby sighed.  He looked back at the building, not saying anything, lost in thought.  Sans leaned against him and watched bugs fly around the streetlights.  They weren’t the only party guests who had escaped outside to get some fresh air, but everyone was mostly leaving everyone else to their own business.  

Grillby put his arm around Sans’ shoulders.  "…well, despite me, you seem to be having a good time."

"your family’s fun, those kids appreciated my wedding jokes, the food’s good and it’s an open bar.”  He was interested in the ceremony tomorrow night.  Apparently, the party came first because the newly married couple would be too tired to participate if it was afterwards.  "and what was that; _despite_ you? come on."

His arm tightened a little around Sans’ shoulders.  Whatever was going on in Grillby’s head, Sans was glad that him coming along seemed to be making it a little better.  He was pretty sure that if his mom had pulled the surprise date thing on Grillby without Sans there, Grillby just would have left the party and not come back. 

Sans decided to change the subject.  "you ever want one of these?” he asked.

“…one of…?”  Grillby went very still.

Sans realized how Grillby had taken the question and had to laugh.  "not proposing, sorry."  Now he wished he’d asked that question when Grillby was drinking something, so he could have gotten to see another fireball spit-take.

"…thank god."

They were agreed on that.  Sans was a few years away thinking about anything like that.  "i was just switching topics.”  

“Okay.” Grillby nodded, amused now.  "Maybe I do.  It couldn’t be exactly like this, but some kind of ceremony would be nice.  In the distant future."  

"it couldn’t?”  

“Well, this part could.  The ceremony itself wouldn’t work.”

“are we talking physically, or traditionally, or what?”

“…both. But mostly physically.”  He looked down at the top of Sans’ skull.  "…what about you?"

"uh.  haven’t really thought about it.”  He mostly hoped that when this thing he and Grillby had was over, things wouldn’t get too weird between the two of them.  He just wanted to have a good time until that happened.  

Grillby looked back at the building.  "We should go back in."

"don’t have to.”

“I know.  I want you to meet my siblings.”

Sans got up, stretching and yawning.  If they stuck around too long, he was going to fall asleep despite all the heat and noise.  Grillby, still seated, wrapped his hand around Sans’ ankle and looked like he wanted to say something.  

Sans waited, but after a minute Grillby just let go of him and they both walked back inside.  

–-

The next night, Sans, Grillby, and a group of non-fire monsters sat behind a magical heat barrier watching the wedding ceremony from a safe distance.  Sans couldn’t really tell what was going on, but the music was loud and energetic and it seemed like a good time.  It was impossible to tell one fire monster from the next.  

“you want in on that?”  Sans asked, Grillby.  "don’t stick here on my account."  

Grillby considered it.  "…no, not really."

Sans shrugged.  "okay.”  He couldn’t blame anyone for not wanting to do something that looked so tiring.  

“The last time I participated was at my brother’s wedding,” he said. “I’m not sure…”  Whatever he wasn’t sure of, he decided to keep to himself.  

“they get a video of that?” Sans asked.  

“…yes.”

“i really want to see that,” Sans said, amused.  

“Sans.  When was the last time you got dressed up for anything?”

“probably graduation.  why?”

“If you have a picture of that, I will find the video from my brother’s wedding.”  

Sans looked up at him.  "you’re driving a hard bargain."  

Grillby was like stone.

"i bet i can find one, somewhere.”  

Grillby nodded.  He rested his chin on the top of Sans’ skull and continued watching the ceremony.  

“hey grillbz.”  

Grillby was holding onto him, so he could feel him brace himself.  "…yes?"

"you know this is less of a _celebra_ tion, and more of a _conflagra_ tion _.”_

He could also feel Grillby laughing, against his back.  "…that was the worst one yet."  

"aw, you have to quit it with all the compliments.  i’d be blushing if i had skin.”  

Grillby kissed the top of his skull.  

They watched the rest of the ceremony, Sans occasionally breaking up the silence with a terrible joke.  Grillby held onto him through the entire thing, and Sans  really would have blushed if he could.  


End file.
